New York has no shortage of brokers. It has a much shorter supply of people like Cobe. From the beginning, he was unusually responsive. Texts got answered. Calls got returned. And if he was tied up, he simply told us rather than disappearing for two days, which already put him well ahead of most of the industry. More importantly, he actually took the time to understand what we were looking for. Our brief was not exactly easy: a home for a family of seven in Manhattan, with a huge private terrace (min 500 sqft) off the living room with a great view, in the Upper West Side, at a very modest budget. And a dog. Basically, we were looking for a unicorn. Cobe found it. The irony is that he found it very early in the process, and we initially turned it down. Instead of pushing us, he took us all over the city, lined up last-minute showings, got us into places on very short notice, and kept finding credible alternatives so we could properly pressure-test the decision. After an extensive amount of due diligence, we eventually realized the first apartment he showed us was exactly what we had been looking for all along. He never said “I told you so,” although he would have been entitled to. He was just as helpful once we decided to move forward. We were dealing with a very competitive application process, an international relocation, and limited U.S. credit history. Cobe helped us navigate all of it, found practical solutions where there were obvious obstacles, and kept the process moving. On top of all that, he got us a significant discount off the asking rent AND a longer term that we preferred. He also has real access. He showed us several apartments before they officially hit the market, which matters enormously in New York when the genuinely good, reasonably priced places tend to disappear quickly. That, to me, is where Cobe is especially valuable. There are plenty of brokers who can show you expensive apartments. Finding something genuinely great, within a real-world budget, that actually fits a complicated set of needs is much harder. Cobe is responsive, resourceful, realistic, extremely well-connected (with the supers and the decision makers, not the slick-talking BSers who actually can't get stuff done), and patient enough to deal with clients who insist on seeing half of New York before admitting he got it right the first time. He gets the first call from us on anything real-estate-related in New York.

Cobe was a class act—professional, well-mannered, and extremely knowledgeable about the market. I was initially against using a broker, but I couldn’t have accomplished half of what he did. I’ll definitely recommend him to anyone looking for expert guidance.